Restaurants and Restaurant Critics Grapple with Their Role in Gentrifying Neighborhoods

KQED's Forum

KQED

Politics, News, News Commentary

4.6 • 656 Ratings

🗓️ 24 August 2022

⏱️ 57 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

When the first coffee shop or food truck rolls into a neighborhood, many locals have come to fear what might be coming next: rising housing prices and displacement. Restaurants, farmers markets and coffee shops are often a harbinger of gentrification. Some restaurateurs, and the food critics that send customers their way, have been grappling with the role they play in disrupting longstanding communities, and what they can do to create a positive presence in a community. As part of our regular series, All You Can Eat, with KQED food editor Luke Tsai, we’ll talk with food critics and food professionals about gentrification, food and community. Guests: Cesar Hernandez, associate restaurant critic, San Francisco Chronicle Luke Tsai, food editor, KQED Mona Holmes, reporter, Eater Los Angeles Reem Assil, chef, Reem's California; author, "Arabiyya: Recipes From the Life of An Arab in Diaspora" Jay Foster, chef, restauranteur and marketplace general manager, La Cocina - non profit that helps immigrant women formalize their food businesses Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Support for Forum comes from Rancho LaPuerta, a health resort with 85 years of wellness experience, providing summer vacations centered on well-being. Special rates on three-and-four-night August vacations include sunrise hikes, water classes, yoga, and spa therapies, all set in a backdrop of a dreamy summer sky. A six-acre organic garden provides fresh fruits and
0:22.7	vegetables daily. Learn more at Ranchoer Tuerta.com. Support for forum comes from Broadway
0:28.3	S.F, presenting Parade, the musical revival based on a true story. From three-time Tony-winning
0:35.1	composer Jason Robert Brown comes the story of Leo and Lucille Frank,
0:40.3	a newlywed Jewish couple struggling to make a life in Georgia. When Leo is accused of an
0:46.0	unspeakable crime, it propels them into an unimaginable test of faith, humanity, justice, and devotion.
1:01.8	The riveting and gloriously hopeful parade plays the Orpheum Theater for three weeks only, May 20th through June 8th.
1:06.1	Tickets on sale now at Broadway, sF.com.
1:08.7	From KQED. From KQED. From KQED in San Francisco, I'm Alexis Madrigal.
1:23.6	As inequality in the Bay Area has continued to increase many neighborhoods all across the region have
1:29.7	undergone massive changes like a wave neighborhoods filled with working class people have seen
1:34.5	home prices and rent skyrocket displacing people further outward while the dynamics are complex
1:40.5	new restaurants new coffee shops new bars they're often a part of these mechanics of
1:45.0	what gets called gentrification. So what responsibility do restaurant creators and critics feel to their
1:50.9	communities? How should a new place engage with the people who live nearby, not just those who
1:56.2	Uber in to try the new hot thing? We'll talk with critics and restaurateurs about all of it after this news.
2:12.5	Welcome to Forum. I'm Alexis Madrigal.
2:15.5	There are nearly 4,000 restaurants in San Francisco alone, and several times that number across the Bay Area.
2:22.6	Some are taco bells, but many are run by a single team or person or family, the building block of a dream.
2:29.2	To find which places are great and which are merely adequate, We rely on the people who write about food,
2:34.4	the restaurant critics and finders of out-of-the-way papooses. They can change the trajectory
2:39.1	of a restaurant in that way whole lives. But increasingly, some food writers are asking
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from KQED, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of KQED and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.